The future they never got
by MissKluck
Summary: This was just supposed to be a normal, easy escorting mission. Nothing to worry about. But why is Kakashi suddenly on time? And why is there black-cloaked shinobi with red spots on their cape attacking team 7? Warning: implied character death. SasuSaku. One-shot.


So I got this prompt: "Genin!Sasusaku: She carries him." on tumblr after "Injuries and blame", and tbh, this was not what I had intended to do, I was thinking fluff and such, but then this just happened. (Please note that I set this before the chuunin exam, which means before Naruto's training with Jiraiya and Sasuke with Kakashi.) So I hope you like it and please tell me what you think! :)

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, only this one-shot is mine.

**The future they never got**

"Sasuke-kun! Sasuke-kun! Stay with us, Sasuke-kun!" A young pink haired girl pleaded as she ran through the woods, carrying a black haired boy on her back. A large area of his clothing was soaked red, and half of it ripped off to give display to the mortal wound the boy had received. The girl carrying him had her clothes soaked through too, but it was all from his blood. It was his blood creating the trail behind them. The girl was crying, desperately pleading for the boy to hold on just a little further while she also led a wounded, blonde haired boy behind her. This was the end, but it was too soon, and it wasn't supposed to happen. No, it wasn't supposed to happen, but it happened.

Earlier the same morning, Sasuke Uchiha was on his way to the 'famous' red bridge to meet up with the rest of his genin team and his sensei. He had already started the day with training as he always did, but he had also prepared as Kakashi Hatake, their sensei, had told them that they might go on a mission today. Translated, that meant that they were going on a mission unless he was caught up 'helping an old lady cross the road' again. When Sasuke arrived he found both his other teammates were already there. Sakura Haruno, the only girl on their team, smiled and greeted him with a sweet; yet shy "Good morning Sasuke-kun" as he arrived. This prompted their blonde haired teammate, Naruto Uzumaki, to turn around and glare intensely at him.

Just then, Kakashi arrived in a puff of smoke and stopped any bickering that might have taken place if not. "Yo! Sorry I'm late, I had to help an old lady get her cat down of a tree," he smiled, his eye crinkling, as he got ready for the annoyed shouts of his students.

"But Kakashi-sensei, you're not late," Sakura replied, surprised at seeing him already. Kakashi had never, ever, been on time before, was it a bad omen?

"Yeah Kakashi-sensei, since when did you start showing up on time? Maybe you're a clone!" Naruto exclaimed, ready to jump on him.

"What did you say Naruto?" Kakashi had already taken out his book during Sakura's outburst and was now lazily looking up from it. Sasuke and Sakura sweat dropped while Naruto seemed more riled up than ever.

"I said, maybe you're just a clone of Kakashi-sensei!" With that Naruto jumped on him, but Kakashi easily evaded him as he had done on the bell test, making Naruto hug the ground instead.

"The Hokage has sent for us, it seems he has a mission for us today so c'mon now Naruto," Kakashi just started to walk away, already headed for the hokage tower. Sakura and Sasuke following close behind, Sakura focusing mainly on Sasuke while Naruto yelled for them to "wait up!".

The mission had been simple enough, they were to follow an escort to another Hidden Village, but they were only escorting them halfway, to the border of the fire country and shinobi from the receiving village would meet them and assist them there. It sounded easily enough, which meant that Naruto was of course mad that it wasn't a more exciting mission, but the mission was still C-ranked so he just growled as they went out of the third hokage's office.

"We meet up at the gate in half an hour," Kakashi said before he disappeared in another puff of smoke.

And, as Kakashi had said, half an hour later they were all there, including the escort and Kakashi. Naruto was still staring suspiciously at the man, Sakura more unsurely while Sasuke looked like he didn't have a care in the world while he on the inside silently agreed with Naruto. The mission went smoothly enough, they didn't meet anyone threatening and no problems arose, that was until they came to the border. There were no guards there and neither were there any shinobi from the other Hidden Village there to greet them.

"What hidden village shinobi were we even going to meet up with?" Sakura asked Sasuke quietly.

He took one glance at her, as if judging her for not remembering it, but then he couldn't remember either. They had said it, hadn't they? These people they had been traveling with, hadn't they said, um, Stone village? "Hn, I'm not sure, maybe Stone."

"Oh, because I thought they said Rain, but I wasn't sure. Then it probably is Stone." Sakura gave a light smile, but Sasuke could see the nervousness she tried to hide. She wasn't exactly good at hiding feelings, but then she'd never been.

Just then two shinobi in black coats with red markings appeared, and what happened next went too quickly for Sakura to register. The two shinobi killed the people of the escort and started to attack team 7 too, Kakashi holding them back as best as he could. Since it was two against one, Naruto rushed in to help and so did Sasuke, leaving Sakura standing slightly behind them without any knowledge of what she should do. One of the shinobi kept throwing bombs around, scaring Sakura, as she didn't know where it was safe to be. The other one didn't seem quite human, as if he was made of tree, but that wasn't possible. Things still went too quick for Sakura to see, it was even worse than with their fight again Zabuza and Haku. She tried to keep up but had to give up pretty soon. Suddenly, Sasuke was standing behind her, and she didn't know why until she saw several swords from the tree man piercing through his body. He had protected her?

"Now look what you did to Itachi's brother, unya," the other shinobi said through his battle with bombs.

"You're no better, almost blowing the nine tails to bits," the tree man growled back. It seemed like Kakashi reacted to this in some way as he managed to deflect and push the shinobi he fought against away while he also sent a bomb into the tree man, knocking him away temporarily too.

"Sakura!" Kakashi called, seeing her support the wounded Sasuke. The swords had been pulled out as soon as the tree man was blown away. "Sakura, you have to carry Sasuke back to the village and take Naruto with you. He's in no shape to fight either and he is the one these men are after, now hurry, I'll hold them off!"

Terrified as she saw Kakashi engage with the two foreign shinobi once more, Sakura carefully lifted Sasuke up on her back, giving him a piggyback ride as she looked for Naruto. He lay a little away from them, bruised and battered but otherwise fine. "Come on Naruto, hurry!" Sakura called as she started back the way they come from. She had no time to bind up their wounds, not that she had the knowledge to it or the equipment for it either, but she wished she had. That she could be of more use.

"Ah, yeah, Sakura-chan, wait for me," Naruto called as he stumbled up and after them.

"H-hurry, we need to get you and Sasuke-kun away from these people and back to the hospital," Sakura called back, trying to focus on the road in front of her instead of the wetness that has started to seep through her clothes from Sasuke.

"S-Sakura-chan! What is this trail?" Naruto yelled, his voice uneven. "It almost looks like- like-!"

"It is," Sakura muttered back, feeling tears start to fill up her eyes. But no, she couldn't think like this, not here, not now. She had to be the strong one now, the one to protect. Now, it was their time to watch her back like she'd wished before, only, not in this way. Not with a dying Sasuke on her back and a wounded Naruto limping behind her. She was supposed to protect her boys like they did for her, but instead she'd just been another nuisance. They probably could have won without her there, or if she had been strong like the others.

"Sasuke-kun, stay with us!" She called back to the boy on her back. She couldn't let it end here, it was too soon. Sasuke was supposed to keep on bickering with Naruto, to be annoyed by her and keep on training together with them so they all became stronger. He was supposed to reach his goals, but also to know her feelings for him. He wasn't supposed to be alone anymore, she, and also Naruto, were going to be the ones to fill up the empty rooms in his heart. He was supposed to be happy, she was supposed to make him happy. This wasn't supposed to happen.

"S-Sakura-chan! I-" Turning around to look behind her, Sakura watched terrified as one of the shinobi from before had started to catch up to them. The shinobi would soon have reached the still stumbling Naruto, which would mean that either Kakashi was dead or he hadn't managed to keep both the shinobi at bay. Hopefully the last one as the other shinobi was still nowhere in sight.

"Naruto!" She called out, petrified as she saw the other shinobi steadily gain in on her teammate.

Naruto seemed to have noticed this too as he suddenly stopped, turning around to face the shinobi coming at him. "Continue on with Sasuke, Sakura-chan, I'll deal with him," Naruto said, his back against them.

"No, Naruto!" She yelled. "Don't do it! We still have time to run away!"

"It's okay Sakura-chan," Naruto called over his shoulder. "It's me they're looking for after all, right? Don't worry about me, believe it!"

"But Naruto-"

"I said go!" With a suddenly serious, and almost authoritative voice, Naruto jumped to meet the shinobi coming for him. Was there really nothing she could do? Tears had begun streaming down her face even before the shinobi reached them. She was so weak, so useless. How had it even come to this? But still, she had to try and save Sasuke as he had saved her. She couldn't let Naruto's and Kakashi's protection go to waste. She set off again, careful with the boy on her back as she ran through the woods, trying to will out the sound of fighting and yelling behind them, as well as trying to ignore the voice in her head demanding her to go back, to help, to do something.

A large bomb shook the ground beneath them and made Sakura lose balance, falling face first to the ground. She lost grip on Sasuke as he too fell off her back and to the ground, wincing slightly in pain, but eyes otherwise closed. They weren't even that far as she could still see Naruto fighting against this other shinobi, trying to evade the bombs as best as he could. Sakura scrambled over to Sasuke again, noting how pale he was becoming and knew that they couldn't go on like this much further. She ignored the dull pain in her leg as she ripped off some of her clothing and tried to tie it around Sasuke's wound to stop the bleeding and put pressure on it. It wasn't a good job that she did, but it would have to do, as they didn't have much time.

Standing up she yelped in pain and immediately fell to the ground clutching her leg. It was probably sprained, or even broken, but she couldn't think of that now, not when Sasuke was dying. She arose again; biting hard on her lip to try and ignore the pain as she carefully bent down and tried to lift Sasuke back on her back. She found that she couldn't do it and instead settled to try and carry him in her arms instead, no matter how much her leg protested. She had already several bruises and wounds from the previous explosions, but she kept on going, more limping than running now.

"C'mon Sasuke-kun," she pleaded, looking ahead instead of at the pale boy. "Just a little further, c'mon, we're soon there. It's just a little further," she didn't know who she was trying to convince; the unconscious Uchiha or herself. She knew they'd most likely never reach Konoha alive, not like they were now. A new explosion interrupted her thoughts, this one was even louder with even more power and the mere wind from it again knocked Sakura off her feet. She used her own body to try and protect Sasuke, she being the one knocked hard into a tree. Sakura sank to the ground, still clutching as much of Sasuke's head and body as she could in order to protect him. They ended up with her halfway lying, halfway sitting against the tree with his head and neck resting on her lap. Blood was still slowly seeping out from his wound, and it would seem that she had wounded her head as blood had started seeping out from her head too. She had a hard time focusing, her head pounding and her leg hurting even more than ever there it lay in an unnaturally weird angle.

Sakura felt exhausted, her whole body aching and she felt too tired to hold up her neck so her head was instead slightly bent forward as she looked down Sasuke through a daze. She had no idea what to do anymore, what she could do anymore. Her leg looked pretty broken, her head pounded from the wound, continuously disrupting her thoughts, and Sasuke was bleeding out on her lap.

A small gurgle sound was heard and Sakura, focusing her stare, noticed that Sasuke was awake. "S-Sasuke-kun, you're still alive," she breathed out, happy that she'd at least managed to keep him alive.

"S-Sakura," he gurgled out, seemingly trying to focus on her too.

"I-I thought you were dead!" It was true, with that wound Sakura hadn't dared to dream that Sasuke would last that long. "I! I! I'm so so sorry for this!" She exclaimed, tears running down her cheeks again. "I- you- I shouldn't have come with you, shouldn't even be a part of the team, I'm too weak anyways and now, because- because you had to look out for me too you're- you're dying!" She sobbed. "A-and Kakashi-sensei a-a-and Naruto, they're both-both! I think they're both dead! If- if only I hadn't been a part of the team, if only I hadn't slowed you down, then-then!"

"Sakura," he gurgled out, blood seeping out of his mouth as he tried to talk. "It's not your fault. We're a team and we protect each other, even to the end. It's not your fault." He actually managed to send her a small smile before he winced in pain again.

"S-Sasuke-kun," Sakura breathed out, her head still throbbing, but she somehow focused on him. Even though her vision at this point was still foggy, she could make out his face; the bruises, the dirt and especially the blood. "I-It's not long now, is it? We don't have much time left, do we?" Sakura didn't know what she was saying anymore. She just couldn't get over the fact that Sasuke was dying, lying on her lap and dying without her being able to do anything.

"No," he muttered. "I am the one dying, not you, you're still alive Sakura. You'll still live," he coughed some more, more blood seeping out of his mouth. His eyes were slightly dull, a little glassed over.

"But how can I live if you guys die?! If you die?! It'll just be meaningless, I'll just be alone again!" Sakura was sobbing, her head throbbing with each sob but still she continued. "A-and this wasn't supposed to happen. Not like this. You weren't supposed to take a hit for me, not like that. You were supposed to live, you _are_ supposed to live! It isn't fair! With what happened with your clan and all." Even though Sasuke was weak he still tensed slightly at her words.

"I'm sorry, it's not-, I'm not in place to say any of this, I know as I don't actually know much about what happened, but that doesn't mean that I don't know that you weren't supposed to die here today! You were supposed to grow strong, become even better than your brother, avenge your clan or kill that man you-that you talked about. And then you- you were supposed to come back to me!" Her tears hit his chin as he weakly stared up at the girl above him. What was she trying to say?

"You! I! I want you by my side! I _need_ you by my side! And I know it's selfish and that I'm young and not much worth, but I just love you so much! You're just such an important person to me! A-and I know that I can't force you to love me, but I still would rather have died here today so that you could continue and fulfill your goals than that you now die protecting me. It isn't fair to you! You should've just let me take the hit! I am weak! We both know it, so why?! Why, Sasuke-kun?! Why did you have to take the hit?! It would have just been so much better if the weak spot was eliminated and you could all continue on stronger, right?!"

"Sakura…" The name seemed to almost caress his lips on the way out. He stared up at the despaired girl, several of her tears spread over his face, mixing up with the dirt and blood. "I don't-I don't think I mind." He found himself muttering and actually meant what he said. He had finally succeeded where Itachi had proven his failure earlier; he had managed to protect someone precious to him, even if it was at the cost of his own life, she was at least safe. She could live on, tell the tale of his miserable life. "There is still a lot I wanted to do, a lot I wanted to see and to say, but I can't. I know I can't, but I already knew that when I jumped to protect you, I knew what I was jumping into, or at least I think I did." He smiled weakly at her, trying to lift a hand, but he was too exhausted.

Sakura, noticing this, took his hand in her own and carefully brought it up in front of them for him. From there on Sasuke did something she'd never expect, and frankly, he was just as surprised. He reached out to touch her cheek, wiping away tears and smearing his blood on her as he did so, but she was too caught up in what he was doing to care. "I think that my body knew what to do at least, it just acted on it's own you know, like when I protected Naruto on an earlier mission. I just wanted my precious people to be safe." He coughed up some more blood, hand sliding slightly down her cheek.

"P-precious people…?" Sakura stared surprised at him, more tears leaking out. "But no, I'm annoying, aren't I? I'm _weak_, we both know and just got it reaffirmed today. Maybe Naruto is precious as he is strong, but me? I- no, I'm just in the way, aren't I?"

"You already heard me, Sakura," Sasuke mumbled out, a trace of his trademark smirk gracing his corners. "I don't know how, but you and Naruto, you've both become someone precious, special, in my heart and maybe, one day, we could have- I could have, we could have defeated the future together." Sakura shook her head as more tears streamed out, but she smiled because she was, or had been, useful to at least someone. Her head started throbbing again, wildly protesting again her movements. "I can only thank you for your feelings for me, for still sticking with me even though I, when it comes down to it, am just a stranger that you like. Maybe one day I could have reciprocated those feelings; maybe I could have brightened up your days as you and Naruto weirdly enough have brightened my days. Maybe, Sakura, maybe…" His voice died out as he gritted his teeth in pain once more, eyes more dull than ever.

"N-no, Sasuke-kun. No!" Sakura sat up too quickly, ignoring her pounding head. "Y-you can't leave me, not after saying that, not after all this! No! Don't, please don't!"

He glimpsed dully up at her, eyes shining with something that could be tears. "I'm sorry Sakura… Thank you, for everything you've done. Thank you." His eyes dulled completely out, what was left of life inside his body left and his hand fell limply at his side. Sakura screamed.


End file.
